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Journalism of Courage
ISLAMABAD, MARCH 26: The day after, there was no bitterness. As Pakistanis woke after a night of tough talking by visiting US President Bill Clinton, they looked back at his speech with satisfaction.
While the military regime has its own reasons to be unhappy about the speech, most Pakistanis welcomed it despite the strong message it held for the government and the people of Pakistan. “What I liked most was that he spoke to the people of Pakistan directly and laid all the cards before them,” said Muhammad Ahsan, a business executive in Karachi. A lot of Pakistanis stayed glued to their television sets for Clinton’s speech, which was aired live on Saturday evening, after a delay from its original scheduled time by about one hour and forty minutes.
Some people said that by giving his message directly to the people ofPakistan, President Clinton left no room for ambiguity or misinterpretationby the Pakistan Government. “If anyone saw the press conference of GeneralMusharraf afterwards, you could get an idea that the Pakistan Governmentwanted to give its own spin to the Clinton visit,” said one banker, whoadded that the message given by the US President “left no one in doubt wherePakistan-US relations stood.”
Sunday’s papers carried the highlights of the US President’s speech with their comments to it. Most Urdu newspapers also carried translations of the speech. In the Islamabad based The News, analyst Adnan Adil wrote that Clinton “delivered a clear message within diplomatic wrapping.” Adil said that the message was: “Forget Kashmir, wind down the nuclear programme, be a trade partner with India, and have a democratically elected civilian government.”
Adil said that with Clinton’s reference to Pakistan’s founding fathers and his talk about Islam and Muslims, Clinton gave a message that “the US respects a distinct identity of Pakistan different from India.”
Adil concludes by saying that in his 20-minute address to Pakistanis,“Clinton brought home the cold ground realities that there is a wide gapbetween their (Pakistanis’) capabilities and their ambitions,reminding them to keep in view their priorities while making plans.”
The respected Karachi-based daily Dawn, in its editorial commented: “By any standards, it was a great speech; full of content and superbly delivered. The language was courteous but none of the meaning could havebeen lost on Pakistan’s military rules, for what President Clinton wasasking them to do was to change course, move towards democracy and makepeace with their neighbours.”
Dawn‘s editorial said that “Perhaps to our chagrin, his speech leaveslittle scope for mounting the high horse of injured Pakistani patriotismbecause he was guilty of neither of these solecisms and, if anything, cameacross as a deeply concerned well-wisher of Pakistan.”
Dawn concludes by commenting, “It can be safely assumed that the official spokesmen will be putting the best possible spin on the US President’s words and extracting from them what comfort they can. But it is also safe to say that in countering the powerful impression he left behind, they have a job on their hands.”
But the US media was not very enthusiastic about the response the President got in Pakistan, adds PTI from Washington. Clinton’s mission to Pakistan failed on three major issues — setting firm benchmarks towards restoration of democracy, an end to violence in Kashmir so that India and Pakistan can resume dialogue, and reduction or elimination of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal, the US media has said.
The only thing he can claim for his Pakistan visit, the networks said, is that he was able to establish communication with Gen Pervez Musharraf.
